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Sir Alex Ferguson is still disappointed he was not able to prise Owen Hargreaves away from Bayern Munich this summer.

Ferguson made strenuous efforts to land the England midfielder right until deadline day. Since then, Hargreaves has suffered the broken leg which will rule him out of action until the end of next month, although the 25-year-old has also hinted he is yet to give up on his Old Trafford dream.

Ferguson appears to be of the same opinion, saying: “If we had got Owen Hargreaves it would have given us a complete variation of the type of midfield players you need in the modern game. We are disappointed we didn’t get Owen but we have people like Darren Fletcher and John O’Shea developing.”

He told http://www.leaguemanagers.com: “Paul Scholes has also returned, Ryan Giggs is showing his maturity and experience, which is helping everyone and you also have a younger player like Kieran Richardson.”

However, Ferguson does admit the loss of Park Ji-Sung for three months with ankle ligament damage has been a blow given the energy the South Korean brings to United’s midfield.

“Ji-Sung is probably one of the most under-rated players I have ever had at this club,” said Ferguson, who celebrates his 20th anniversary with the Red Devils on November 6.

“The players love him, even all the staff say ‘you can’t leave Park Ji-sung out of your team’. He has become a very important player.”